Brenton Grove’s Whirlwind Season

June 15, 2016

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From the high of claiming his first race win on debut to having a monumental stack during qualifying at Phillip Island, Team BRM’s Brenton Grove has had a whirlwind start to his CAMS Jayco Australian Formula 4 Championship season.

Two months on since the championship last raced at Phillip Island, teams and drivers enjoyed the brief break to regroup and analyse the last two rounds.

With limited experience racing a Porsche GT3 Cup car prior to joining the championship, Grove has impressed with his initial speed and commitment whilst learning his open-wheel race craft.

“The first two rounds, I’ve kind of experienced everything I can in motor sport,” Grove said.

“I’ve won a race, I’ve crashed, I’ve stalled on the grid, I’ve hit someone, I’ve been hit, everything I could do in motor sport I’ve kind of already done!

“It’s good in that regard, but I definitely want a couple more clean races to finish without having a drama.”

No driver was more pleased for the mid-season break to arrive than Grove.

“I think for me it came at a perfect time,” Grove said.

“After the first two rounds, I’ve experienced a lot of stuff. It’s good for me to kind of do a stock check, take everything in, look at what’s happened, why it’s happened, analyse everything and then kind of reset.”

Outside of racing the Grove Hire Team BRM car, Grove is also studying at Bachelor of Business at Monash University.

“It’s also good to get away a bit from motor sport. I’m doing university exams at the moment, so it’s good to take the focus off it,” Grove said.

“Saying that… it’s good to get back into the swing of it, and I had a test day at Mallala so I haven’t been completely out of the car, but it’s definitely time to hop back in.”

Grove has visited Sydney Motorsport Park on multiple occasions as part of Stephen Grove’s, Brenton’s father, Porsche Carerra Cup campaign but has never driven at the venue prior to the most recent Formula 4 test day.

“Like every track you go to, it’s different than what it looks like on TV or video,” Grove said.

“So to drive the track was cool. I’m actually really enjoying it, it’s a cool track to drive for sure.”

While Grove’s first win is now but a distant memory, Grove is itching to replicate a similar result going forward.

“It was obviously a good feeling, it was a tough race having Will [Brown] chasing me and I’d never won a race before. I’d never done karts and in every other series I’ve raced, I’ve never won,” Grove said.

“So for me it was a new feeling but something once you have it, you want it again. You can’t get rid of that feeling.”

Round Three of the CAMS Jayco Australian Formula 4 Championship returns to Sydney Motorsport Park on July 1–3 as part of the Shannons Nationals.